Effizienzanalysen frühkindlicher Bildungs- und Betreuungsprogramme: das Beispiel von Kosten-Nutzen-Analysen

Abstract

In social science literature there is a wide range of effectiveness studies for early education and care programmes for young children. But these studies usually distinguish the effects of these programmes without considering their costs. This is where efficiency analysis studies in Economics begin. This article presents three fundamental approaches to efficiency analysis before looking in more detail at one of these approaches, the cost-benefit analysis. The results of cost-benefit analysis studies depend on the parameters, which can vary between different cost-benefit analysis methods, and which are explicitly pointed out and discussed in this article. In view of the fact that there are not yet any comprehensive and differentiated cost-benefit analysis studies for German programmes, the possibilities of a cost-benefit analysis are presented by reference to three well-known examples from the research community in the USA:a cost-benefit analysis of the "Perry Preschool Program", the "Abecedarian Program" and the "Chicago Child Parent-Program". Like other cost-benefit analysis studies, they show that if early education and care programmes for young children are of a high quality and specifically target disadvantaged children, they can lead to great benefits, but that these benefits are dependent on the parameters of the cost-benefit analysis. The article ends by outlining possibilities for a differentiated cost-benefit analysis of German programmes.